Cooperation on AIDS

I have read with great interest the special supplement to your paper devoted to the problem of AIDS (Aug. 9).

I share your concern about the scale of the threat which is brought to the mankind by the AIDS epidemic. It is indeed the plague of the 20th Century. And if the effective measures to battle this disease are not taken now, the consequences could be disastrous.

The problem of AIDS is treated very seriously in the Soviet Union. Decisive efforts are being made to find possible AIDS treatment. Last August the Presidium of the U.S.S.R. Supreme Soviet issued the decree on the “Measures of Prevention of Contracting the AIDS Virus.”

According to this decree, the Soviet government is charged with the task of doing everything necessary to establish broad international cooperation on a bilateral and multilateral basis aimed at the prevention and treatment of AIDS.

Much is being done in the world today to fight AIDS and its transmission. The World Health Organization, which adopted a global program and strategy of fighting AIDS in May, is playing a particularly important role in this process.

At the same time, it is more and more obvious that the growth of the AIDS epidemic dictates the need for higher levels of international cooperation.

In our view, it would be expedient to support the national and international efforts of the United Nations. Special U.N. prizes for creating an anti-AIDS vaccine and other discoveries in this area could be instituted as early as the current session of the General Assembly.

It seems the time has come to study the matter of establishing an international research center (laboratory) on AIDS similar to the International Cancer Research Agency in Lyons, France.

We also believe that coordinated efforts by the U.S.S.R. and the U.S., including those in the United Nations, could give a powerful incentive to the development of international cooperation in the fight of this global threat.

As to the alleged “anti-American campaign” in the Soviet mass media on the question of the origin of the AIDS virus, the Soviet Ambassador to the U.S., Yuri Dubinin, as was mentioned in your newspaper, stated that there was definitely no such campaign and that separate publications could not express in any way the official Soviet position on this matter. I would like to make this point once again.

It is important to rise above mutual reproaches and think of joint efforts for saving the lives and health of millions of people.

VALENTIN M. KAMENEV

Consul General of the U.S.S.R.

San Francisco